Just as a sidenote … I decided to buy myself an album by The Corrs.
Well, I looked into Wikipedia - and found out how much an incompetent record company is able to f*** up a range of band publications :

It is just depressing to me that there are "bonus tracks" scattered throughout the world … Even of compilations there exists versions only in single countries (the "Dreams" compilation has a bonus DVD in Spain only) …

From the official web site FAQ :

3. When will 'VH1 Presents: The Corrs, Live in Dublin' be available outside America?
There is currently no release information available.

4. When will 'Best of The Corrs' and 'MTV - Unplugged' be available in America?
There is currently no release information available.

From the Wikipedia entry on "Talk On Corners" :

However the record company were rather less happy with it and wanted the band to continue recording more new tracks. When The Corrs refused, Atlantic threatened not to release the album at all and manager John Hughes was forced to make guarantees about future album sales in order to gain their cooperation.

From the Wikipedia entries of their albums :

Bonus Tracks released in Japan only
Bonus tracks - on some issues of the basic release in Latin America
Bonus Track also on its own as a bonus on an Australian release
Bonus track on Japanese, French & Australian editions of the album
Bonus Track on Limited Asian AVCD edition
Bonus track available on Japanese and limited German release

Now THAT's what I call scattering songs around the world !

I have no idea why Atlantic did this at all. To me, this is pure incompetence, not releasing ONE version throughout the world, but to fragment the albums into special editions for some countries only … Most people won't care, I know, to the mainstream buyer this is irrelevant … But to me this is … just horrible, because if I want to buy an album, I want it *complete* !

So now I would have to buy internationally - for high prices maybe even …

The only thing Atlantic *really* did with this is fuelling the secondary marlket - and, well, I don't think that their fans would be happy …

*sighs*
*shakes head*

Edit : Uh … Wikipedia discussion :

Height

My father has personally seen the Corrs and can guarantee that Jim Corr is at least 2 inches shorter than Andrea

Your father is not an acceptable source. Unless he's a journalist and it was in an official capacity, or something. —IceflamePhoenix 11:00, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

— “ Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.“ (E.F.Schumacher, Economist, Source)

That's been going on for years, Alrik. The Japanese releases, in particular, have always had something unique about them. I think it's actually a way for each international division to possess its own unique local copyright. Major PITA for a serious collector, though.

— Sorry. No pearls of wisdom in this oyster.
Dallas Cowboys: Let's Get to Work / / Detroit Red Wings: Welcome, Coach Blash!

Yes, dteowner, I often see this with japanese releases as well, and I *just* don't understand it.

The only possible argument I've come up with is that they want to try to promote "western" musicians with this bonus stuff. But there's a quirk in this resoning : Japanese people will perhaps not even know that they have something the rest of the world doesn't have ? (I mean bonus tracks on CDs, for example.) Unless they do a research …

On the other hand, if this resoning would be true, we would see *lots* of unique releases of well-known Japanese artists here in the "western region", with bonus tracks and extras that aren't available in Japan … But I don't ever remember having seen this …

And this is true for all other "special releases" throughout the world as well …

— “ Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.“ (E.F.Schumacher, Economist, Source)

I actually popped MJ's Thriller back on to my iPod for the first time since … jeez, I don't even know the last time I listened. Bought it several years ago when pepsi was doing 'free iTunes song on bottlecaps' thing … my kids actually like a couple of songs.

I put these two gents up a while back, but I've really been listening to the ep a lot recently. Great stuff:Snow in Mexico

I've been adding and subtracting off my MP3 player the past week or two. I'm a little troubled with the process. I don't have any complete albums left. I've always given Mrs dte a rough time because she buys a cd to play 1 song over and over and over. I'm not some "the album is a work of art" snob, but I enjoy "judging" an artist by more than the radio single. By moving toward a "singles" approach, I'm chipping away at that position. Gonna be tougher to give Mrs dte crap.

— Sorry. No pearls of wisdom in this oyster.
Dallas Cowboys: Let's Get to Work / / Detroit Red Wings: Welcome, Coach Blash!

And since we've been talking about heights: Mr Lucassen is good for 2.02 meters (No, I won't translate for you units-of-measure challenged people out there. It's bad enough that I have to translate my words from the heroes' tongue. Zpffft!!! Chmeee!!!).

pibbur

I have so many Ayreon CDs that I find it difficult to remember which song is from which album… my favorite Ayreon songs are Two Gates from the 'Electric Castle' epos, and Merlin's Will and The Awareness (both from 'The Final Experiment').

But while I was on Amazon I found another thing by them - Live at the Village Vanguard Vol. 1 … which was only $3.56 and was actually from right around the time I saw them live … at the Village Vanguard, no less …

Ghost in the Shell - Reincarnation.
Short introductory speech by the master himself in Japanese (I don't understand that much, sadly), the song starts at ~1:38. This one is shorter than the one before, but also stunningly beautiful.

— "Mystery is important. To know everything, to know the whole truth, is dull. There is no magic in that. Magic is not knowing, magic is wondering about what and how and where." ~ Cortez, from The Longest Journey

Not *currently* listening but I just came back from the Hultsfred Festival where I saw a couple of bands, some mini-reviews:

Dropkick Murphys: Good but not great, but it had more to do with the crowd than the band I think, since they played as the second band of the whole thing and people weren't in the mood yet.Franz Ferdinand: Great show with a good number of "live-only" divergences from the album versions of their songs. A bit strange song selection at times but that didn't matter so much with all the effort they put in.Kings of Leon: Good but nothing spectacular, they pretty much just did their thing and a little talkie in between. The drummer looked VERY bored.Regina Spektor: I love her! So sweet and still a show with a lot of energy and happiness. I watched her in the second row together with my sister and we were both a bit lyrical afterward.The Killers: Best show of the festival for me, which probably had a lot to do with me standing front and center. Slow start after opening with Human but it picked up and the the last seven songs or so were all really good picks. Unfortunately I missed White Lies in exchange for my good spot.Nashville Pussy: Never heard of them before but it was worth checking out. Quite obscene much of the time but they played old-school Rock'n'Roll with energy and passion, and the lead guitarist was impressive.Slagsmålsklubben: Electronica/bit-pop/dance/drunk-nerds-with-computers-on-a-stage at its best, they did a show that can't really be compared to anything I've seen before. Unfortunately I got pushed and fell in the mud close to the front, felt dangerous for a little while but just muddy and smelly afterward…